TSA Seizes Disney World Toys 62
8-year-old Jeremiah Ramirez had just lost his father to cancer, so his mom took him to Disney World to raise his spirits and take his mind of the tragedy. While there he picked up a Pirates of the Caribbean toy gun and sword, and was hoping to bring them back to North Carolina, that's when the TSA stepped in. When he tried to go through security at Ft. Lauderdale-Hollywood Airport his toys were confiscated. "It's very upsetting because at one point I had told one of the employees, 'You know this is not a real weapon,' and he said 'Yes, I understand that, it doesn't matter,'" said mom Maria Edge. I may not be clear on all the reasons the terrorists hate us, but stuff like this is why I do.
So they won (Score:5, Insightful)
We've got to hand it to the terrorists... They're good at what they do. They set out to affect our lives in a detrimental way, and we let them do it, doing their work for them most of the time, with "anti-terror" measures and "national security" legislation.
Re:So they won (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the fact that so many road warriors have retired from travel is good evidence that they won. Personally, I quit taking road warrior jobs not out of fear of terrorists, but simply because I am tired of pathetic TSA bullshit making me throw away my shampoo and mouthwash every week.
The TSA theatrical security is far more pathetic than security through obscurity ever was.
The real terrorists are the TSA themselves.
Re: (Score:1, Flamebait)
In my road warrior job, I usually put my shampoo, toiletry and and tools in my checked luggage. Didn't really want to carry them anyway.
Re:So they won (Score:4, Insightful)
Whenever I fly, I try to put as much as possible in my carry-on, because I generally don't trust the airlines to deliver my stuff to the proper destination.
Re: (Score:2)
I put all my valuables in my suitcase. TSA agents need DVDs, laptop power cords, etc- too.
I've had 4 DVD wallets stolen- so I'm really not joking here.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Yeah but at least then you know where they went.
Re: (Score:1)
Why am I modded Flamebait?
Why is whining about the TSA informative, but unemotionally pointing out an obvious way to minimize TSA hassle considered flamebait?
P.S. I usually found the motels had shampoo, so I didn't need to carry it anyway.
Re: (Score:2)
The hassle should never be there to begin with. Your excuses are much like saying that you can avoid the Gulag by choosing to avoid ever speaking your mind.
Re: (Score:1)
Sigh.
I wasn't making excuses for them. So why take out your TSA frustration on me?
I have traveled thru 19 countries and dealt with strict customs. China, Egypt, Israel, Japan, more. Hand checks, etc.
I too have been harassed by TSA. (I was driving. Rude comments. Everything opened and left scattered on the back seat. Laptop and car registration dumped on the floorboard. Had to find my passport. To say I was peeved is an understatement.) The airport TSA are relatively polite.
In my job, I always had t
Re: (Score:1, Interesting)
Call the Wahmbulance (Score:1)
While the story is an obvious example of bad judgment, and as such is deplorable; from my experience it is the exception. For most of 2003 and 2004 I traveled to different destinations around the US almost every Sunday and came back almost every Friday. While I obviously never went to every airport in the country, I traveled through most the major ones. I had one instance at my home airport (DIA) where some ditzy woman asked me if I would like to take my shoes off when I was running late for a flight, and I
Re: (Score:1, Funny)
Then by process of elimination, if all these innocent people are being hassled, and you and your boss have had no issues whatsoever, the only reasonable conclusion is that you and your boss are terrorists!!!
Get em!!!
PS - correct they don't lose bags.. they 'lose' bags.... and break guitars..
Re: (Score:1)
We've got to hand it to the terrorists... They're good at what they do. They set out to affect our lives in a detrimental way, and we let them do it, doing their work for them most of the time, with "anti-terror" measures and "national security" legislation.
I am afraid that you are correct. The USA is acting so paranoid that it has become ludicrous; I for one am not interested in visiting the USA nor host any websites or applications there. With every irrational and paranoid knee jerk the USA is becoming more irrelevant to the rest of the world. Handing victory to the bad guys on a silver platter; show some character for a change, and make the bad guys work for it !
These things aren't for you to worry about. Just be happy that you're safe and keep quiet. Good boy!
Toy Weapons (Score:4, Informative)
Toy weapons were banned as carry-ons before 9/11.
Keep them in your checked luggage.
Re:Toy Weapons (Score:5, Funny)
Think of the children.
Crying themselves to sleep.
MWAHAHAHAHAAAA!!
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Toy Weapons (Score:4, Insightful)
But does anyone ever stop to ask... WHY?? Seriously, why do we allow people to push us around with arbitrary regulations like this? What has gone wrong in our society where we think that this is OK? I mean, if the airlines were behind it I would say that it is stupid, but when we have the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT (TSA) involved it ceases being a silly rule and becomes a violation of our civil rights. I mean, carrying a toy gun is not an essential civil liberty, but that is not the point. The point is that the GOVERNMENT is telling me that I cannot do something without providing any reason. If the government is going to tell us what we can and cannot do, we need to demand that they give us a DAMN good reason for it. This no longer happens, which is very apparent in airline security, drug laws, and many other facets of our modern society. Wake up, people. Ask questions, demand liberty.
Re: (Score:2)
But does anyone ever stop to ask... WHY??
Firing a weapon in a pressurized cabin is serious business. If a weapon is seen, it needs to be known that it is a real threat before risking firing at the person holding it and possibly damaging the aircraft and forcing an emergency landing, which may be unsuccessful and kill everyone on board. It started with not wanting to fire a gun unless you see a gun (meet threat with equal threat), and toy guns could look quite real. So they're banned. As are even 2-dimensional pictures of guns, including on T-shirt
Re: (Score:2)
If this is the case, why not ban toy weapons altogether? I mean, aren't they concerned about, you know, shooting little kids with fake guns?
This argument doesn't wash and se
Re: (Score:2)
If this is the case, why not ban toy weapons altogether? I mean, aren't they concerned about, you know, shooting little kids with fake guns?
An aircraft is a controllable environment. The rest of the world is not.
And just maybe they'll consider traveling by land, sea, or telepresence instead if they're not willing to give up some individual liberty temporarily for the security of the collective.
This argument doesn't wash and sets up a dangerous slippery slope -- we can always be safer by sacrificing more of our liberty. We could slash the crime rate down to next to nothing if only we all put CCTV cameras in all of our houses, and let the police come in for periodic spot checks to make sure you are being nice.
That's why I added emphasis tags around "temporarily".
I for one feel that this extra measure of security is not worth the cost of liberty. Some would disagree, but the Constitution is on my side.
I don't feel much like flying in today's climate either. That example of the Optimus Prime T-Shirt was a real-world modern example (albeit in the UK).
If I had to take a commercial flight as part of my job, I'd want some kind of compensation for the loss of human dignity, and I don't mean an extra packet of peanuts.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I feel that the same goes for air travel -- it is the only viable means of real long distance travel, and the government has made it so that we cannot utilize this wonderful tool without bending over and giving up every last one of our civil liberties.
Fine, but I'd be more inclined to protest about the genuinely stupid and inconvenient things, like being forced to take off shoes and belts, being prevented from taking a bottle of water etc. that have been introduced as part of the post-9/11 security theatre. Trying to carry something that actually looks like a weapon on a plane is the sort of thing that anybody with an ounce of common sense ought to avoid without being told.
Re:Toy Weapons (Score:4, Insightful)
Explosive decompression isn't explosive and a couple of bullet holes aren't going to cause a dangerous drop in cabin pressure.
Err, sorry, what I meant was FEAR!!! FEAR FEAR FEAR!!!!!!1!.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:1, Offtopic)
You are using English. Please learn the difference between loose and lose; they're, there, and their; your and you're.
You left out 'yore.' I see that one about every other week.
Yore? (Score:2)
You left out 'yore.' I see that one about every other week.
Strawman sucked through a bullet hole! (Score:2)
Explosive decompression isn't explosive and a couple of bullet holes aren't going to cause a dangerous drop in cabin pressure.
OK, so explosive decompression, fat people being sucked out of tiny portholes, planes going into crash dives because of one bullet hole etc. is thoroughly mythbusted. However, it kinda missess the point.
Even on land, at sea level, 200' away from the nearest flammable substance, firing a gun inside a metal tube into which a hundred or so soft, squishy, potentially panicky people have been packed like sardines, with no way of getting out, in is a pretty stupid thing to do.
On a related note, I always wonder
Re: (Score:2)
Firing a weapon in a pressurized cabin is serious business. If a weapon is seen, it needs to be known that it is a real threat before risking firing at the person holding it and possibly damaging the aircraft and forcing an emergency landing, which may be unsuccessful and kill everyone on board. It started with not wanting to fire a gun unless you see a gun (meet threat with equal threat), and toy guns could look quite real. So they're banned. As are even 2-dimensional pictures of guns, including on T-shirts (however futuristic Optimus Prime may be, he's got a gun). By eliminating all false positives, you greatly reduce the possibility of errors of firing on a toy or not firing on a real weapon mistaken for a toy.
But other weapons could be harmful to passengers and you want to be able to protect individuals, so drawing a gun on knives and swords become permitted. Your enforcers on aircraft are specially trained to know how to safely fire on an aircraft, so they can fire on non-guns too. So toy versions of those weapons are banned too.
If someone were stupid enough to market black leather gloves imprinted with the image of a gun such that by extending the first and second digits it would look like you're holding a real gun, black leather gloves would be banned too.
An in effective process, probably invented by an MBA who thinks that with enough processes in place everything will be better.
For the next phase, the process people will introduce "passports" for people they trust and have been pre-screened for travel. No wait...
Re: (Score:2)
> Firing a weapon in a pressurized cabin is serious business.
No, not really. That's just an urban myth.
Re: (Score:1)
@HTH NE1; "Firing a weapon in a pressurized cabin is serious business."
Oh, I agree, the last time I fired one of those toy swords my pirate ship's skysail slipped off my mainmast and slammed on the the deck tearing a hole in it, yea matey.
You've got to be kidding me. Does forcing blue-haired Jewish ladies to empty out their shampoo bottles and making them take off their shoes really make you feel safer? Please. Its all about power and appearance. Those in power are powerless to do anything about terrorism,
Re: (Score:2)
The why is simple. There are toy weapons that look very real and because somebody could say that a real gun is a toy. Or they could doctor up a real gun to look like a toy. That rule has been around since long before 9/11 It really isn't a terrible rule at all. Just put them into your checked bags.
Why would anybody really need to ask it is kind of like having to ask why running a red light is a bad idea or why you shouldn't BBQ in the middle of a fireworks store.
Yes some of the rules about things like nail
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No grey area? Sure the all black 9mm plastic replica found in a 23 yr old's backpack should be taken away, but the Disney Pirates of the Caribbean plastic sword and gun held by the 8 yr old?
People need to use their judgement once in awhile. If there's a doubt, take pictures, video, record licenses, double check, etc, but don't rip toys out of children's hands.
Re: (Score:1)
Airport security... (Score:3, Funny)
Years ago, before 9/11, I heard this story. I don't know if it's true. But it is consistent with what I've come to expect from airport screeners...
.
Seems this fellow was flying home bringing toys for his kids. Star wars action figures, to be precise. Airport security caused a fuss, and confiscated the guns from the action figures. We are talking a piece of plastic smaller than a dime here folks.
.
Now this fellow was about to make a scene when he realized:
Yep, that's about what I've come to expect from our airport security...
Re: (Score:1)
Sad To Say... (Score:2, Insightful)
It already has. Things may start to get better under Bush lite.
Least Disney has a heart (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Least Disney has a heart (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a marketing department, not a heart. One is a fist-sized mass of complexly arranged muscles and nerves ; the other is a large building filled with overpaid shit-for-brains with the communal ethics of a pile of fetid dingos kidneys.
Re: (Score:1)
That's a marketing department, not a heart. One is a fist-sized mass of complexly arranged muscles and nerves ; the other is a large building filled with overpaid shit-for-brains with the communal ethics of a pile of fetid dingos kidneys.
Same result, and I'll give them the same respect either way. A marketing department should behave like it "has a heart". That's just smart marketing, especially for Disney.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't know about this kid in particular, but back when I was that age, part of the thing that made something like that special was that it was mine that I picked when I was there. A replacement, however well intentioned, was never the same.
I was probably a spoilt little brat, thinking about it.
Never to early for TSA Christmas (Score:1)
Someone's kid probably having a birthday.
Or did you check eBay to see if it was being sold there?
This is why ninjas are superior (Score:2)
this is actually not a sign of the times (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The Florida version of the ride opened in March, 1967.
Re: (Score:2)
Er... Sorry. It was the CA version that opened in 1967. The one in Florida was 1973.
I always get Disneyland and Disney World backwards.
Really? (Score:2)
The article says the toys were confiscated at security. That means the kid's toys weren't in his checked baggage.
So, the brat puts his carry-on bag--which contains things that look suspiciously like weapons--through the baggage screening x-ray machine, and now the dumbass mother is complaining about having the toys taken away? Everyone knows how careful TSA must be today, so she should have known better than to not put those toys into a checked bag.
TSA is doing its job. I'm not saying that it's right, bu
REAL guns were allowed when I started flying. (Score:3, Insightful)
There were no security measures whatsoever, and no need for them.
Clearly, something has happened since then that has caused a bunch of people to want to kill Americans. They didn't in 1960, and they do now.
I can't imagine what it was.
Nice. (Score:1)